Reprinted from

February 1996, Vol. 3, No. 2

Great Expectations
Alón Trio Speaker And Home Theater System
BY TOM MILLER

Sometimes a review goes off-track. Even a highly favorable review such as the July 1995 Adventure cover story on the Alón Petite loudspeaker. When that happens with a designer like Carl Marchisotto, he will not let the record stand. He'll fly across the country just to prove that his $995 baby does bass and swings like Tarzan. Recall, we reported that the bass of the Petite only reached roughly 70Hz and that there was a slight disruption of the music's rhythms.

But Marchisotto said No! And guess what? Marchisotto was right. The Petite does have better bass than we reported and it can lock on to a groove and follow it religiously. But the conditions have to be right. In one instance, it's the room you put the speaker in and how you place it that makes the difference. That's the bass. In my new room in Salt Lake City, the Petite easily delivers 55Hz flat, which is quite satisfying bass. It is also important that the Petite be set up to fire straight ahead in order to achieve the tonal balance and bass coupling designed by Marchisotto. Resist the urge to toe them in.

As for the rhythmic issue, that's all about time alignment. The cabinet of the Petite is squared, so the tweeter and woofer drivers are not time aligned. Thus, the rhythmic distortion. Marchisotto now overcomes this by tilting the Petite back nine degrees on its stand. This brings the tweeter and woofer into alignment and locks in on the music's beat. With these adjustments in set-up, the Petite slid right into the Top Ten Finds for 1995 in our last issue, and indeed it is one of our all-time favorite small speakers.

Ah, but did you think for a moment that Marchisotto would stop there? Of course not! He wants to deliver more bass. And he wants to surround you with sound for your movies-all based on the lil' ol' Petite.

And, yes, he's done it.

The $500 PW-1 is a fascinating single-cabinet stereo woofer designed for dedicated use with the Petite. Together they comprise the Alón Trio system. The PW-1 is hooked up to the amplifier driving the Petites. It has a low-pass crossover that rolls off everything above 55Hz. In this configuration, the Petites are still run fullrange, so don't expect to get louder levels out of them. There is no volume adjustment for the PW-1, so room placement is critical in achieving the 40Hz extension and smoothly blending the PW-1 with the Petites. This is not only possible, it is, surprisingly, not all that hard.

Marchisotto typically places the PW-1 off to one side, near a room comer. This may help in achieving the bass extension, but in my room it became problematic. On big or sustained bass notes, the woofer's location was evident, drawing the lower frequencies toward that side of the room. For example, the bass drum in "No Sign Of Ghosts" from Casper (MCAD -1 ] 240) is located on the right side of the soundstage. With the woofer outside the right Petite, the location of the drum seemed appropriate. Reversing the channels, however, did not move the bass drum to the left side of the stage - confirming that humans can detect the source of frequencies below 100Hz rather easily.

The solution to this "bass pull" was to locate the PW-1 between Petites. Then, inch by inch, to find the location where the bass evened out best. Once this was accomplished in my room, the bass blended superbly and the image location was much more confident. lt was still possible on sustained bass notes to detect the PW-1 as a sound source, but what do you expect for $500? What you get, here, is acceptable extension of the Petites' sound. This certainly enriches the presentation, giving the bottom octaves some snap. And the bass quality is up to the task, accurately separating the hollow-body bass guitar, keyboards and kick drum on Bonnie Raitt's "Feeling Of Falling" (Road Tested, Capitol 8 33795 2). This isn't state-of-the-art bass (Marchisotto builds the Poseidon subwoofer for that purpose), but it is satisfying. Whether you want the Petite alone or the Trio depends entirely on your thirst for bass; some will be happy with the Petites. If you go with the Trio, though, I recommend that you take some time auditioning solid-state amplifiers. The Petite loves tubes, but the PW- 1 can use the control that a solid-state amp provides.

Cinema Sound From The Trio
Marchisotto didn't stop with the Trio- like everybody else, he recognizes the hot market for home theater. And more specifically, he sees the need for high end leadership in cinema sound. The Trio makes an outstanding foundation for a home-theater system. First, it plays loud enough and has sufficient bass to fulfill the needs of all but the most demanding enthusiasts. More importantly, the Petite speakers are remarkably intelligible, rendering vocals- spoken or sung- with superb clarity. This is the speaker's hallmark and it serves the center channel of a movie soundtrack with distinction.

Using the Trio as a starting point, Marchisotto recommends a single Petite for the center channel and a pair of Alón C1 bipolar speakers ($660 each) for surround duty. The C1 can also be wired for dipole operation- it has a matching set of drivers on the front and back of the speaker- 5.25-inch woofers and 1-inch dome tweeters. All in a box that's the same size as the Petite.

Set up with the Theta Data II laserdisc player, the Angstrom 200 surround processor and digital converter and a brace of conrad-johnson Premier Eleven power amplifiers, the Trio/C1 Home Theater system was exemplary on matrixed surround music as well as movie soundtracks. The soundfield created by the system is seamless and the surround speakers are inaudible as sources. Given their similarity to the Petites, the C1 surrounds with the center-channel Petite not only sound great, they're ready for AC-3, in which all five channels need to work in uniformity.

At $3,300, the Trio/C1 Home Theater system is not cheap. But if you're looking for an elegant high-performance cinema sound system that doesn't gobble up your living space, this is a serious contender. Just understand that 120db sound-pressure levels are beyond its capabilities. (You shouldn't be listening that loud anyway) And if you value the sound of music, this system should be on your short list. Near the top.

Alón Trio/C1 Home Theater System
Tonality81 Slight bloom in the midbass, especially if not perfectly set up.
Dynamics80 It's got startle factor enough for the movies and nuance resolution enough for your heart.
Resolution79 Needs a little bump in the volume before it fills out harmonically.
Imaging83 Breathtaking, open, precise. If it doesn't explore every last nook of the hall, so what?
Timing80 TILT! It's a good thing for this speaker. It swings even better in matrixed surround.
Overall81 A system for music and film lovers in the right sized room.